Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Sigmund Freud — Cocaine. To Freud, cocaine was more than a personal indulgence; it was a veritable wonder drug, and for many years he was a huge proponent of its use in a wide array of applications. Freud’s paper titled “Uber Coca” in 1884 was one of the first to propose drug substitution as a therapeutic treatment for addiction.

Francis Crick — LSD. Evidently, Crick – of the DNA-structure discovering Watson, Crick, and Franklin – at one point told a close friend that Cambridge University’s researchers often used LSD in small amounts as “a thinking tool” and he had actually “perceived the double-helix shape while on LSD.”

Thomas Edison — Cocaine Elixers. Thomas Edison was one of many people of the period known to regularly consume the cocaine-laced elixir “Vin Mariani,” a Bordeaux wine treated with coca leaves.

Steve Jobs — LSD. Jobs believed that experimenting with LSD in the 1960s was ” one of the two or three most important things he had done in his life.”

John C. Lilly — LSD, Ketamine. Neurocientist John C. Lilly was a pioneer in the field of electronic brain stimulation. He was the first person to map pain and pleasure pathways in the brain; founded an entire branch of science exploring interspecies communication between humans, dolphins, and whales; invented the world’s first sensory deprivation changer; and conducted extensive personal experimentation with mind-altering drugs like LSD and ketamine.

Carl Sagan — Marijuana. Preeminent astrophysicist and cosmologist Carl Sagan not only smoked marijuana regularly, he was also a strong advocate for its use in enhancing intellectual pursuits. Sagan contributed an essay, penned under the assumed name “Mr. X.”, to the 1971 book titledMarijuana Reconsidered that spoke to the virtues of marijuana use.